I've been doing some thinking about Clark's fundraising numbers, and the rumor that he might top out at $12 million dollars.

If Wesley Clark raised 12 million dollars this quarter, and maintained the same fundraising numbers as from last quarter, he would have been eligible for over eight million dollars in matching funds.

However.....this USA Today article indicates that Clark is due $3.7 million dollars in matching funds. This has to be due to either a change in donor profiles such that Clark is fundamentally only getting very large checks and almost no small money, or his fundraising is below expectations. Both factors could also be interacting with each other to one degree or another.

If so, this would indicate that Clark's grassroots support isn't the base from which Clark draws a large portion of his fundraising money, but more of the $2000 kind from wealthy donors. In essence, Clark's campaign might be funded by wealthy individuals rather than his grassroots support.

I believe strongly in my candidate (he is the best man to run this country AND the best man to beat Bush). I know many Clark supporters who are donating for the first time. I also know many people who gave Dean 20-25 bucks because they were so angry at Bush and Dean tapped into that anger (so while they might pull down Dean's average and be included in his grassroots totals they have moved on to other candidates).

The mind games played in this primary election are never ending. Paid people work the Clark blog trying to overstate the estimate of fourth quarter fundraising so that Clark supporters will be disappointed instead of happy when the fundraising totals are released. If Clark comes in second place I will be VERY happy because I know all of his money comes from true supporters (not Bush supporters trying to win the election for their good buddy Bush).

Vermont is the most, or one of the most, liberal states in our Union. If one were "appeasing" Republicans, it would be of the Jim Jeffords sort and not the BushCo sort. Vermont has three Congressmen: Jeffords, Leahy and Sanders. This spectrum is Center>Left>Far Left.

When Dean is attacked from the right it is from the Center, nationally speaking. When he is attacked from the left it from the far left, nationally speaking.

This is something that one should keep in mind when one reads press reports out of Vermont.

in campaign commercials run mercilessly in October 04, and that will confuse the heck out of our base voters such as African-Americans, Labor etc. and they will stay home in droves.

And if some of you think Clark's pro-repug views will get him some right of center votes, I refer you to president Truman's famous quote: "given a choice between a republican and a republican-lite, they will vote the republican every time" still holds true IMO.

Lets face it, Dean is our best chance. Dean's centric policies in Vermont will only help him draw from the middle. And there are NO VIDEO'S OF DEAN'S PRO-REPUBLICAN ORATORY AS EXISTS FOR CLARK.

84. You actually miscalculating the proper use of innovation....again!

Clark can run his own commercial of HIMSELF praising the Bush team in their hopes of what they would hopefully accomplish in EUROPE....During the General election, Clark via a commercial will intimately tell the average "numbskull" voter, that he too was fooled by the Bush administration...but after seeing (show unemployment lines, bombs in Iraq, the deficit shooting up)them in action, I believe that Americans now deserve better. We may have been fooled once, but we shall not be fooled again!!!!

So the video of Clark can actually be used against Bush very effectively.....making millions of GOP members vote Clark...knowing that there is not stigma attached to it...and that everyone can be fooled.......

There simply is nothing more grassroots than drafting your candidate, PERIOD. While I applaud the Dean camp's organization it is all about the organization and very little to do with Dean. You could switch him out with John Edwards and get the same numbers.

You cannot win an election by rallying just the base of a party. If Dean wins the nomination and not Clark and loses to Bush in the landslide that awaits him, people like yourself deserve four more years of Bush.

The Democratic party is a party of hope, of ideas. Not one of anger. It may take a Mondale type defeat for people to get over themsleves but hopefully people will begin to take notice of every single poll of Dean vs Bush and notice the consistent a$$ kicking he recieves.

and the cable news had video of him at the Arkansas GOP Convention....and he admits he profited well from his speech circuit. No need to do any additional leg work as you said, we've been there and done that.

I hope not, but there are too many suspicious items out there...First, it is indisputable that Clark was a big promoter of Bush*co, based on his active efforts to promote the repug agenda. It is all on tape, and Rove can run those commercials mercilessly in October. If that won't confuse our base, and make them stay home on election day,dunno what will.

Is it possible Rove decided to unleash Clark after it was clear Dean was leading the race for nomination? If Clark has been a true democrat, and knowing his well known ego factor, why did he wait so late to declare? Could it be that Rove is most worried about Dean and wants to cover the basis of repug agenda by foisting Clark over unsuspecting dem voters? What guarantee is there that once elected he won't change his tune as he has already done over and over? After all he has no political record to count on.

So if Clark wins the nomination, Rove would have his cake and eat it too. If Bush* wins, all is well for Rove. If Clark wins, the repug agenda could be revived in a heartbeat.

Look at Dean's political record. He's more Republican than Bush and from what I understand Dean is the plant by Rove in an effort to try to wrest control of the Democratic Party from Clinton and to weaken it for generations by turning it into a party of anger with no vision or ideas. If Dean and Rove can do that then the Democratic Party is no longer the party of hope.

Clark can run his own commercial of HIMSELF praising the Bush team in their hopes of what they would hopefully accomplish in EUROPE....During the General election, Clark via a commercial will intimately tell the average "numbskull" voter, that he too was fooled by the Bush administration...but after seeing (show unemployment lines, bombs in Iraq, the deficit shooting up)them in action, I believe that Americans now deserve better. We may have been fooled once, but we shall not be fooled again!!!!

So the video of Clark can actually be used against Bush very effectively.....making millions of GOP members vote Clark...knowing that there is not stigma attached to it...and that everyone can be fooled.......

that's why there's such a big drive to raise funds at the last minute, like Dean's bat, before he decided to go bananas and do without the federal money because he didn't want to limit his spending.Clark is due money for the last quarter,ended September.

wouldn't be surprised if the original poster is right. After all, Clarks LAST job before running for President was as a LOBBYIST for companies wanting defense contracts because of his contacts and pull. (Made over $100,000 in commissions, so I guess he did something right.)Do these same people want to have an oar in both camps, Republican and Democratic? Bet they do. Would like to see who is contributing to both Clark and Bush.

We will lean more heavily on media," Clark campaign manager Eli Segal says. "We will not have the time to have the kind of deep field staff that others have in place."

Advertising on television is expensive, but Clark had raised $9 million by the end of November and expects $3.7 million in matching funds next month, the most of any candidate.

do the math: obviously matching funds don't work on a strict 1:1 ratio. If he's raised 9 mil by the end of November, is due 3.7 in matching funds, and Q4 isn't up yet, he's on pace to surpass his $12M goal.

From what I see, Clark is doing pretty good for someone who came to the game late.

September wasn't just the point at which Clark announced his candidacy after years of preparation, it was the point at which he decided to run. Two months later his fundraising is second only to the campaign of a man who first started planning to run before 2000.

Not too shabby.

However, be that as it may, we'll soon have a chance to see how this plays out in the voting booth. Less than three weeks to go, right?

17. the thing about clark being in the game for only three months is false

the buzz had already started around clark last summer, around june or july......so Clark already had name recognition/buzz going into the game, and that's a part of campaigning. So essentially that'd mean that Clark was in the "game" for about six months.

There has been buzz for several months, but it takes a while to build acampaign organization. I have been working for Clark for some time, and I can tell you that the organization had been weak. It is rapidly gaining effectiveness.

He is having his Million Dollar Challenge until Dec 31. He is at $504,399 as of this post, with 4,406 contributions. Averaged out, that is about $114 per contributor. Dean's average, by contrast, hovers around $77-$80 per contributor in each of his various fund drives.

Couple the Clark;'s higher amount per contributor plus the fact that it takes him more than twice the time it takes Dean to raise a million bucks, and you cannot but realize that his support comes of a different, much smaller demographic.

29. Wow! What a contrast! $24 per contributor - call the populism police!

Averaged out, that is about $114 per contributor. Dean's average, by contrast, hovers around $77-$80 per contributor in each of his various fund drives.This is the funniest thing I read today! Thanks for that!

As stated before, it is not merely the dollar amount that is significant, it is the time it takes to raise it.

Let's do some back-of-the-envelope calculating.

Dean takes roughly a week, usually only 5 days, but we will call it a week, to raise 1 million dollars. Last quarter, he averaged more than a million per week, but for arguments sake right now we will say one million per week. His average hovers, as stated previously, at about $77-$80 per constribution.

That comes out to 12,500 (as rough figure, of course) people per week giving money to Dean.

Clark, judging by his own posted numbers on his website, takes at least twice that time to raise the same amount. For this, we will call it an even 2x, meaning he takes two weeks to raise 1 million rather than just 1 week. His average contribution thus far comes out to about $114 per contribution. This means that for him to reach a million, roughly 8,700 people have to donate.

However, he does not raise a million in week, he raises only half that in a week's time, therefore the number of people contributing money to him in a single week is only about 4,350.

Dean has nearly 3 times as many people donating to him per week than Clark.

The above uses the candidates' web sites as a basis for fund raising numbers, and does not reflect other possible contribution.

The 3.7 is a combination of last quarter and projections from early this quarter. Everything is matched for Clark up to $250. If it is from wealthy donors the number would be higher because everyone would be maxing out the $250.

This USA Today article contains some information that blows holes in my matching funds projections. I had projected Clark will be eligible to receive 8.7 million dollars off of $15 million in fundraising for Q-3 and Q-4. While USA Today supports the total fundraising amount, they are projecting Clark will be eligible for only $3.7 million dollars. This can either be due to timing of donations or a change in donor profiles as he may just be getting very big money donations instead of the numerous and more valuable small donors.

IF this is true then Clark will have a significant cash on hand deficit compared to Dean as Dean had a 9 million dollar COH advantage at the end of the third quarter and the USA Today article is indicating that the Dean campaign believes that it should be able to increase its cash on hand for this quarter. Clark is spending some serious bucks on consultants and advertising so if his matching contribution is this low then he is facing serious competitive disadvantages against Dean.

I love the fact that he hasn't been a politician. He actually believes in accountability, following through on your promises, and will fight for what is best for the american people and NOT special interests groups.

For the sake of argument, consider a hypothecial one-donor situation over four quarters.

Clark: 0+0+100+100 = 200Dean: 80+80+80+80 = 320

By the definition you are offering, Clark would be getting money from $100 fat cat contributors and Dean would be getting his money from $80-contributing average working people. But in this case, it would really be Dean getting the most money per contributor ($320 compared to $200).

Clark started late, so his contributors have to dig deeper. We are playing catch-up. I just donated $100 for the quarter.

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